


Grand Illusions

by tyroneslothrop



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Abuse, Dreams, Gaslighting, George Orwell would be proud, M/M, Mad allegorical, More religious symbolism than you can shake the holy cross at!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-23
Updated: 2015-05-23
Packaged: 2018-03-31 21:30:42
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,847
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3993547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tyroneslothrop/pseuds/tyroneslothrop
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis meets a man in his dreams.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Grand Illusions

There was a burning bush in the corner of his eye, flickering and dappling a kaleidoscope of oranges and yellows over the black and white tiling. The scene composed itself in front of him, a panorama of blackness. He footed himself, and drifted into the void, smothering himself in the seemingly never-ending bleakness. The smoke from the bush was almost palpable, the wretched smell drifting into his lungs and finding home within him, the dust wintering in the haze.

 

Louis had fun navigating the foggy labyrinths of his mind, until an eeiry chord penetrated the air, chasing away the smoke. The warmth flees from his face, making him feel stark and naked. He startles, his eyes flying wildly for the perpetrator. There was a white dot at his left, almost like an accidental stain, like his imagination slipped and dotted the canvas when it was painting the scenery.

 

Louis steps up to it, carefully at first until he realizes his feet are making no noise. Closer, the blob begins to shape itself as a rectangle, then it forms into a piano.

 

In front of it, he takes a few cautious steps to the side. He's met with a mop of unruly, curly brown hair, and a pair of trembling pale hands, the fingers almost exactly like the ivory beneath them. Blood trickles from one of his fingernails to the crack in between the keys.

 

The mess of hair moves, and Louis realizes the person beneath it is looking at him. The emerald pupils staring into him strike him dead in his soul, and for a second, he, the piano, the scenery and the burning bush are all real.

 

Then him and sleep escape him. Louis was in his cold bed once again.

-

He manages through the work day just fine. A couple of unruly customers, but he's fine. One person has eyes the colour of jade, and Louis startles in his seat. But this customer is chubby, and their fingers aren't near enough close to the shade of snow that piano boy was. He exhales, and asks the customer how they are.

 

"Yes, we can fix your iPhone screen for you", he says to them. They smile, and leave. Their mouth isn't even the same shape as dream boys'. Louis is an idiot. He can't wait to crawl into bed.

 

His dream man doesn't arrive that night. Or the next night. It's seven days until he visits again.

 

When his eyes adjust, he's beside a dry, cracked riverbed. The sun swells and pulses down on him, beating a migraine into his skull. He scrapes his nails against the dry mud beneath his hands and glances around, the slightest bit of hope in him flickering away with the shadows, until a C major slices through the air.

 

In the middle of the river lies a transparent piano, filled to the brim with water. There were fishes trapped inside of it, dancing around the strings and below the mans hand. His dream man sits upon an uncomfortable looking chair. His eyes are boring a hole into his, and Louis flushes a deep crimson. He stumbles to him.

 

"What's your name?" he finds himself croaking into the air, and it barely sounds like him, like he's become someone else. He half-heartedly expects a reply.

 

"Cain... nah I'm joking. M' names 'arry..." the piano boy slurs, and he then thunders into a rendition of The Rites of Spring. His voice is deep and slow, and Louis wants to carve all his dreams around it. He hits the keys with startling precision, like he's been practising for this moment his whole life. Igor Stravinsky wept.

 

Then, suddenly, as the crescendo reaches its peak, the piano bursts and fills the riverbank. To Louis' astoundment, the water only licks around his feet, and flies straight past him. The dead leaves find life again. The ground moistens. Harry drowns, the floating keys the only proof of his existence. He's awake again.

 

Two grandiose trees framed the entrance to Louis' comfortable bungalow. They interosculated with the hedges, framing the house as if it was an old polaroid. The wind shouted soliloquies to anyone that would listen, and the slate striked his window in rapid succession. It sounded like they were trying to communicate to Louis, but their lexicon and vocabulary was lost in translation to his sleeping frame.

 

He woke with a start, when a particularly violent bolt of rain made the house tremor. He showered, changed and made move to get his keys and leave for work. He opened his drawer in which he kept them constantly. They were gone.

 

Louis proceeded to disembowel the house, ravaging every nook and cranny for his keys. Nowhere to be found. He had to face the ineluctable. He dialled his work.

 

"It appears that I have misplaced the operational device which I use to obtain admittance to my vehicle."

 

"Will you be coming in?"

 

"I shall have to use public transportation. Forgive me if I should be late."

 

He went out to the bus, and in a brief passage of time he was at his work. When he set out to do his daily technical work, he found that he could not find his tools, or the array of iPhones he needed to operate on. While he was turning the office inside out for his tools, his boss Simon entered. Usually his avuncular presence soothed him, but now it just got him vexed.

 

He briefly pondered the possibility of there being correlation between this and the keys mishap that happened in the morning, but soon dismissed the frivolous idea. Simon asked him what was wrong. He went home and sunk into his bed, praying for sleep.

 

Louis awoken with a start the next day, his alarm clock echoing around the room, making the foundations of his house tremble and vibrate. He shut it off, and prepared to cleanse and clothe himself, and make his way to work. He pulled open his keys drawer, and was shocked to find that they were not there.

 

He commenced with a brief search of the house. Then, finding that they were nowhere to be seen, began to face the inevitable. He dialled his boss.

 

"It seems I have misplaced my keys."

 

“Will you be coming in?”

 

“I'll use the bus. Might be late.”

 

Entering the building, he started to hunt for his tools. All he could find was his screwdriver. It was enough though, and he managed a couple of repairs before his shift was done.

 

When he retired to his bed that night, his dream man visited him again. He wasn't whole, and Louis had the sickening feeling that he was looking into a fragmented mirror. He could make out the odd flash of emerald and the rare splash of cream skin, but no more.

 

“Hi Harry,” he whispered, scared of startling the gloominess that enveloped him.

 

“Hi. Say, have you ever thought that the way you interact with customers is a bit weird?” Louis blinks.

 

“You always say 'Hi, how are you?' before asking what they need fixed. It's a bit presumptuous. It's also a bit flirty.”

 

Louis tries to collect his thoughts and form a retaliation, before a face looms out of the shards of glass and kisses him. 

-

The weather was violent. Louis woke up, and got prepared for work. He checked his drawer for his keys. They weren't there.

 

"I have lost my keys."

 

He left for the bus. The water drenched him. When he got into work, he thankfully found his equipment. He did some work. Then he went home and slept.

-

lousi woke up happy! he went to the bathroom and brushed his teethypegs and then put on his clothes then he looked for his car keys but he could not find them :(

 

“lost my keys :("

 

he got the bus 2 work! the wheels on the bus go round nad round roudn and round round and round! round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round round and round!

 -

Louis gets fired from his job, and he begins to neglect hygiene and food. His ribs stick out like xylophone keys, and his breathing sounds through the empty house like a car engine trying to start up. On the rare instance that Louis does hydrate and feed himself, he expects a piano to pop up in his kitchen. It never does, and he stumbles to his bed again saddened, wishing for sleep. He begins to have sleeping pills delivered to his door, and he wonders if overdosing on them could make you sleep forever.

 

They've begun to get intimate, and when he wakes from these dreams, he finds his sheets plastered around him, semen sticking itself to his boxers, and the smell of penetrated rectum and sweat foggy around him. His arse throbs.

-

 There are four walls slotting themselves around Louis, all within arms reach. Dust and disease begins to settle into his bones, and he tries to scream. He battles with the mahogany, his arms aching until he hears a gentle clink and a pyramid of fabrics surround themselves around him. It's clothes, a swimming pool of shirts and yoga pants. He's in a closet. He could almost laugh.

 

He tries to bust the doors apart, to meet his mysterious piano man. He doesn't. He awakens, with the cold air lapping around him and his wardrobe hanging half open. 

- 

The waveforms of his dreams thrum around him, the dry pulse of a dying man. He seeks his piano man. Harry. There's white snakes slinking around the tiled floor, and Louis has to concentrate in order to not trip over them in this monochrome, tiled abyss. The trajectory of his dreams can only carry him so far. He stumbles through the grey smoke of his imagination, until he trips apon a blob of black among the debris. There's a burning bush perched upon his piano, and the smoke curls into Louis' lungs, almost cracking them, splitting him from the inside out.

 

"I wanna be with you...," a voice croaks through the darkness.

 

Me too, me too, Louis thinks. "How can we be together?" he enquires instead. Snakes begin falling from above, and one splatters on top of Louis' head. He pays it no mind.

 

Harry licks his fingers, and reaches to touch the bush. His finger makes contact, and the bush extingushes itself in front of Louis' eyes. He can't see again. His head floats in a halo of fire.

 

"Just wake up," Louis blinks. "Fucking wake up," Harry growls. And he's awake. Amongst the battering wind and the cobwebs.

 

Until he feels a shiver against his neck.

 

"You wanna be with me forever?" the blackness growls, and he nods, his neck grazing against a slice of steel.

 

"I love you," the depthness of his dreams mutter. Then suddenly pain. Then suddenly darkness.

 


End file.
